Some days I say to God: Why even bother? Leave me alone! I am not worth your energy.

After all these years of following him and claiming I am a believer, I find that, probably, I am the worst Christian in the world. I don’t kill and I don’t sleep around, but I get angry and I gossip.

I don’t exactly lie, but I avoid the truth, or change it—ever so slightly.

I am not very kind or generous, especially when I have not slept enough, or when it is a particularly tight month financially. (I am also not generous with certain items, such as my chocolate or my favorite pens.)

As I have mentioned in this blog before: I am not very courageous.

I think about reading my Bible, but oftentimes I find magazines, newspapers and my books more interesting.

I think about praying, but my mind wanders when I pray for longer than 30 seconds.

I have totally given up on fasting.

I prefer sleeping in and going for walks on Sunday mornings.

I get bored during worship, especially if they sing more than three songs, and the choirs more than once in the end.

I can’t quote hardly any Bible verses, and I have a hard time finding some of the books in the Bible.

So there, now I have said it! It’s not a secret to God that I am such a loser. He knows already. But in case you thought I had it together, now you know I don’t.

And, the thing I remind myself is that His love does not depend on my Bible memorization skills nor on my church attendance. Just like I love my kids just the same whether they read Shakespeare or not, whether they get all A’s or not, whether they take out the trash when I ask them, or not, so God’s love for me is the same—always.

Fortunately noone is keeping track! Everyone else is so preoccupied with their own inadequacies they are too busy to notice yours. And besides, memorizing Bible verses didn’t make the list of fruits of the Spirit!

I thought of your post this morning as I was reading something else…
“If as a Catholic I may be allowed to say this, I believe the dark side of Protestantism consists in its being too much the prisoner of the left brain. The pulpit is enthroned as the center of the church’s space, to move the word of God into the center. This is a good theological concern, but at the same time it has idolized and exalted the left side of the brain. It’s given us the impression that we could unite people with words. That’s absurd. We’ll never all consent to the same words- that’s why the word became flesh.”

From Richard Rohr, while he is talking about the need to see Jesus in the flesh, in the least around us. He’s talking about not needing to do all the “correct” things, except find Jesus around us. In refugees, for example. 🙂 There seems to be no shortage of “the least” around us.
From the book Simplicity.

Sign up for notifications via email.

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 283 other subscribers

Enter your email...

About Oddny

Oddny is the founder of a non profit organization working with children affected by conflict and oppression. She is a motivational speaker, the author of 2 books, and mother to 3 beautiful girls.Read More